This past week I engaged in a new delight: badminton. Have you played recently? It is so ridiculously fun.
This new discovery came about as a result of an outdoor birthday celebration in our backyard. My son brought with him a badminton set which he had just purchased. After eating burgers on the patio, we set up the net and started to play, that is, we attempted to play, as in hitting that elusive birdie. Since there were six of us, I volunteered to sit out and watch for a while. I could not believe how awful these players were. I mean, really, our family has not a lick of eye-hand coordination, but couldn’t somebody hit that thing? It was just a constant stream of whiffs in the air, or birdies stuck in bushes. It was painful to watch. I kept suggesting, “Keep your eye on the birdie!”, which is of course an infuriating suggestion to someone who believes they are of course already keeping their eye on said birdie.
Finally, my turn. I was ready to show them how it is done. Or not. Dang, that thing is hard to hit. I blamed it on the puny birdies that came with the set, so I promptly went to my constant buddy, Amazon.com, and ordered more. A few days later, John and I tried them out. The birdies were in fact bigger, and a little easier to hit. But there was nothing we could do about our total lack of athletic prowess. Instead of keeping score, I decided to count how many volleys we could get in a row. We got up to the grand total of “9”. Once. Keep in mind, we were trying to get as many volleys as we could. We were not competing, we were cooperating.
Still, in these waning days of outdoor activity, badminton was a real delight. The net is still up, we’re still trying, and I’m still counting.